Independent Institute Senior Fellow Robert Higgs is interviewed by Scott Horton of Antiwar Radio on the widening gap between public and private sector pay, the increasing affluence of military towns compared with others, the disappearance of traditional checks on government power, and the predation and incremental ratchet effect of expanding governmental powers that increase temporarily during wartime but never really recede.

In June 2008 the U.S. Supreme Court handed down a landmark ruling on the Second Amendment individual right to keep and bear arms with its Heller v. District of Columbia decision. Two years later, in June 2010, a second historic decision squeezed through the highest court in the land.

Senior Fellow Robert Higgs talks about his book, Neither Liberty nor Safety: Fear, Ideology, and the Growth of Government, on The Holistic Survival Show with Jason Hartman. Higgs sheds light on the history of institutionalized violence implemented by a bloated federal state, caused by a misguided faith in larger government to ensure a freedom from fear. The Necessary and Proper Clause? People have been trying to loosen the bounds of the Constitution virtually from the time it was ratified to the present, Higgs cautions.

Senior Fellow Robert Higgs is interviewed here by Scott Horton on Antiwar.com Radio, warning those who long for total governmental and economic collapse to be careful what they wish for. Higgs also explains why federal spending cannot continue at the current record levels without a failure of the bond market. He further compares the military and economic over-extension of the Soviet Union prior to its collapse to the United States as a warning against rampant spending by the government.

From ancient times to the present, politicians, bureaucrats, and interest groups have gained resources and control over the public by playing to peoples fears of various crises and by offering solutions that often only make problems worse.

The reception and presentation of the Thomas S. Szasz Awards for Outstanding Contributions to the Cause of Civil Liberties to Robert Higgs and Robert Spillane, followed by a special forum featuring Dr. Higgs on Liberty and Leviathan.